Chirped Fiber Bragg Grating Research Articles

Chirped fiber Bragg gratings directly inscribed by a femtosecond laser in an ytterbium-doped fiber for spectrum recovery, loss compensation and effective use in a CPA scheme

Point-by-point femtosecond laser inscribed chirped Bragg gratings are good candidates for use in fiber chirped pulse amplification systems due to the high flexibility of their dispersion properties, low cost, and no length limitation. However, such gratings have two significant drawbacks: high losses and distortions of the short-wavelength part of the spectrum when operating in the normal group velocity dispersion mode. We propose a novel approach based on writing such gratings in a highly doped active fiber, which allows us to correct both shortcomings. We have also demonstrated, for the first time to our knowledge, a successful use of such gratings as stretchers in a fiber chirped pulse amplification system.

44-fs, 1-MHz, 70-µJ Yb-doped fiber laser system for high harmonic generation

We report the development of a robust Yb-doped fiber laser system based on chirped-pulse amplification (CPA), generating 44-fs laser pulses with up to 70-µJ pulse energy at a 1-MHz repetition rate. It consists of a Yb-doped nonlinear polarization evolution (NPE) mode-locked fiber oscillator, a chirped fiber Bragg grating (CFBG) stretcher, a wave-shaper for manipulating the spectrum of the signal, cascaded fiber amplifiers, and two compression units. The output pulse duration of 44 fs for efficient high harmonic generation (HHG) was achieved by a multi-pass multi-plate Herriott-type non-linear compression unit.

Figure-8 mode-locked Yb-doped fibre oscillator with a nonlinear amplifying loop mirror and power amplification

Abstract We report an all-polarization-maintaining Yb-doped fibre (YDF) femtosecond (fs) laser source at ∼1 µm comprising a figure-8 mode-locked oscillator and two YDF amplifier stages. By employing a nonlinear amplifying loop mirror, we could achieve dissipative soliton mode-locking with an output of 24.6 mW at a repetition rate of 6.2 MHz. In our experiments, a Raman signal of 16% in the pulse energy helps to obtain stable mode-locked operation in the figure-8 oscillator. The dissipative soliton pulse from the oscillator is stretched by a chirped fibre Bragg grating and is amplified by a two-stage YDF amplifier. After compression, the YDF master-oscillator power-amplifier system yields fs pulses with a pulse energy of 2.3 µJ and a pulse duration of 274.6 fs at a repetition rate of 0.52 MHz. The output pulse energy is limited by the third-order nonlinearity of the fibre amplifier chain. Prospects for further pulse energy scaling are discussed.

Magnetic field measurement with temperature compensation based on a fiber ring microwave photonic filter and Vernier effect.

We proposed, a novel, to the best of our knowledge, magnetic field measurement with temperature compensation based on a fiber ring microwave photonic filter (FR-MPF) and a Vernier effect. The sensing head is made up by attaching the fiber Bragg grating (FBG) on the magnetostrictive material. Based on the wavelength division multiplexing, two FR-MPFs with different optical carriers can eliminate the influence of the temperature. The Linear chirped FBG (LCFBG) in the FR can transfer the magnetic field variation to the time delay change as well as the frequency shift. Two FR-MPFs with close free spectral ranges can implement the Vernier effect, which can improve the sensitivity. The experimental results show the sensitivity is 58.3 kHz/Oe and the magnification factor is 214. The proposed sensor has merits of high resolution, high sensitivity and low cross-sensitivity, which has potential applications requiring high precision detections.

A non-invasive pipeline heat flux measurement method and application based on CFBG

A non-invasive, real-time monitoring, spectral analysis heat flux sensor with single measuring point based on chirp fiber Bragg grating (CFBG) has been proposed in this paper. When CFBG senses heat flux, the linear increase of axial thermal expansion leads to spectral broadening. The measurement of heat flux can be realized by the measurement of the full width at half maximum (FWHM). The theoretical model and working principle of CFBG heat flux sensor are established to determine the heat flux sensing characteristics of CFBG. The numerical analysis and theoretical calculation show that CFBG heat flux sensor can realize stable transformation of heat flux and FWHM. A heat flux calibration platform was built and its feasibility was verified by simulation. The sensitivity of CFBG sensor to monitor heat flux in a wide temperature range is 1.078 pm/(W/m2). The heat flux of the pipe wall at the outlet of the axial variable piston pump in the hydraulic system was quantitatively measured by the CFBG heat flux sensor. The sensor has a spatial resolution of 1 cm, a length of 10 mm, a diameter of 0.125 mm, and a sensitivity of 1.078 pm/(W/m2). It has the advantages of high spatial resolution, single measurement point, real-time measurement, small installation space, and non-invasiveness. The theoretical model can provide theoretical guidance for the design of fiber grating heat flux sensor, and it is convenient to design a series of sensors for specific measurement requirements.

Vector magnetic field measurement based on fiber ring microwave photonic filter with the Vernier effect

A vector magnetic field sensor based on enhanced Vernier effect is experimentally demonstrated. The Vernier effect is generated from two microwave photonic filters (MPFs) with close free spectral range (FSR), which is constructed by the fiber ring (FR) and the optical carrier microwave interferometry (OCMI). Linear chirped fiber Bragg grating (LCFBG) is inserted in the FR to act as the dispersion element to provide time delay. By attaching the fiber Bragg grating (FBG) on the magnetostrictive material (MA), the magnetic field can be transferred into the wavelength shift, as well as the time delay of the FR and the frequency response of the FR-MPF. By choosing opposite dispersion of LCFBGs and closer FSRs, cascaded FR-MPFs based sensor can greatly improve the sensitivity. The sensitivities for the magnetic field intensity and direction are 127.71 kHz/Oe, the magnification factor of which is 432, and 418.16 kHz/deg. The proposed scheme has merits of high sensitivity and interference immunity, which is suitable for high precision measurement.

Sub-surface thermal measurement in additive manufacturing via machine learning-enabled high-resolution fiber optic sensing

Microstructures of additively manufactured metal parts are crucial since they determine the mechanical properties. The evolution of the microstructures during layer-wise printing is complex due to continuous re-melting and reheating effects. The current approach to studying this phenomenon relies on time-consuming numerical models such as finite element analysis due to the lack of effective sub-surface temperature measurement techniques. Attributed to the miniature footprint, chirped-fiber Bragg grating, a unique type of fiber optical sensor, has great potential to achieve this goal. However, using the traditional demodulation methods, its spatial resolution is limited to the millimeter level. In addition, embedding it during laser additive manufacturing is challenging since the sensor is fragile. This paper implements a machine learning-assisted approach to demodulate the optical signal to thermal distribution and significantly improve spatial resolution to 28.8 µm from the original millimeter level. A sensor embedding technique is also developed to minimize damage to the sensor and part while ensuring close contact. The case study demonstrates the excellent performance of the proposed sensor in measuring sharp thermal gradients and fast cooling rates during the laser powder bed fusion. The developed sensor has a promising potential to study the fundamental physics of metal additive manufacturing processes.

Optically Delaying a Radio Frequency–Linear Frequency-Modulated (RF-LFM) Pulse Using Kerr Comb Carriers and Off-the-Shelf Concatenation of a Linearly Chirped Fiber Bragg Grating and a Chirped-and-Sampled Fiber Bragg Grating

We demonstrate a low latency delay of a radio frequency (RF)–linear frequency-modulated (LFM) pulse by modulating it onto optical carriers from a Kerr comb and sending the signal through a concatenation of off-the-shelf linearly chirped fiber Bragg gratings (LC-FBGs) and chirped-and-sampled FBG (CS-FBG). We characterize the frequency response and latency of the LC-FBG and CS-FBG. Then, experimentally, the LFM pulse performance is characterized by measuring the peak sidelobe level (PSL) at the output of the tunable delay system. The experiment, performed with an LFM pulse of 1 GHz bandwidth at a 10 GHz center frequency, shows a PSL better than 34.4 dB, attesting to the high quality of the buffer RF transfer function. Thus, the proposed optical memory buffer architecture, utilizing compact devices based on a Kerr comb and FBGs, offers several benefits for delaying LFM pulses, including (i) a larger tunable delay range, (ii) low latency, (iii) wide bandwidth, and (iv) high PSL.

Apodized chirped fiber Bragg grating for measuring the uniform and non-uniform characteristics of physical parameters

An apodized Chirped Fiber Bragg Grating (CFBG) is presented to compute and depict the sensing response for various uniform and non-uniform profiles of the temperature and the strain for different chirp parameters. The effectiveness of the CFBG can be reduced owing to the appearance of wide-scale side lobes as well as increasing group delay ripples (GDR). The introduction of apodization profile is highly impactful to enhance the sensing efficiency by minimizing the side lobes level along with the quantity of GDR. The sensing response of the apodized CFBG with different chirp parameters are evaluated for various ranges of uniform temperature (30 °C–80 °C) and strain (300 µ∊–550 µ∊). Furthermore, different non-uniform Gaussian profiles are also introduced to illustrate the overview for detecting and locating the spot size sources of measurands. This approach is highly desirable for estimating the structural integrity by ensuring the safety, efficiency, and reliability of the CFBG-based sensing outcomes.

Inscription of Long Chirped Fiber Bragg Gratings in a Nonuniform Fiber for Wide-Range Tunable Delay Line

Inscription of Long Chirped Fiber Bragg Gratings in a Nonuniform Fiber for Wide-Range Tunable Delay Line

All-fiber, high-speed, and high-resolution dispersion measurements of chirped fiber Bragg gratings

All-fiber, high-speed, and high-resolution dispersion measurements of chirped fiber Bragg gratings

Fabrication of high temperature chirped FBG by thermal stretching of regenerated FBG

This paper presents an innovative method of high temperature sustainable chirped fiber Bragg grating (FBG) fabrication from the uniform regenerated FBG or their combination written by a single uniform phase mask. A thermal stretching technique is employed that modifies the grating structure of uniform FBGs, resulting in chirped FBGs capable of withstanding high temperatures without compromising their sensing capabilities. Thermal regeneration of uniform FBG was carried out at 850 °C by applying step annealing schedule. Thermal stretching of single regenerated FBG and dual regenerated FBG was carried out for the fabrication of high temperature chirped FBG. For both approaches, the FBG was stretched by applying strain ∼1200 µε along the length of the grating. In the single FBG approach, the chirped grating with reflection intensity 4500 (A.U.) and bandwidth ∼ 7.1 nm was fabricated by applying thermal gradient from 860 °C to 900 °C across the length of strained thermally regenerated FBG. In double grating approach, the chirped FBG with reflection intensity 6000 (A.U.) and bandwidth 12.7 nm was fabricated. The fabricated chirped FBG can sustain temperature upto 900 °C. This innovative method not only extends the operating range of chirped FBGs to high temperatures but also opens up new possibilities for fabricating chirped FBGs of longer length and bandwidth using low-cost uniform FBGs.

High-Resolution and Large-Dynamic Range Fiber-Optic Sensors Based on Dual-Mode Direct Spectrum Interrogation Method

Conventional optical fiber temperature/strain sensors often have to make compromises between the resolution and the dynamic range. Here we present a new method that meets the measurement requirements for both high resolution and large dynamic range. A high-quality optical fiber Fabry-Perot Interferometer (FPI) constructed using a pair of chirped fiber Bragg gratings is employed as the sensor and a dual-mode direct spectrum interrogation method is proposed to identify the small drift of external temperature or strain. As a proof-of-concept illustration, a temperature resolution of 0.2 °C within 30–130 °C is demonstrated. For strain sensing, the resolution can be 10 µε within 0–1000 µε. The measurement resolution can be improved further by routinely increasing the reflectivity of the CFBG and the cavity length and the sensor can also be mass-produced. This new sensing schema not only resolves the conflict between the resolution and the dynamic range of fiber-optic temperature/strain sensors but can also be extended to other sensors and measurands.

CPA-ready femtosecond pulses at 1 MHz from a custom recycled output Mamyshev oscillator

A cost-effective fiber laser architecture is introduced in which the output seed pulse is stretched and then returned in the oscillator for an additional single-pass amplification without spectral broadening. It is implemented in an all-PM-fiber configuration based on a Mamyshev oscillator with a low repetition rate of 1 MHz. It features a linear oscillator bounded by two offset chirped fiber Bragg gratings accompanied by a third one acting as a pulse recycling filter. The latter tailors the pulse profile in amplitude and phase to seed femtosecond chirped-pulse amplification systems without additional pre-amplification nor pulse stretching. A single-pump prototype generating 200-nJ, 100-ps pulses compressible to 290 fs at 1030 nm and at 960 kHz is demonstrated. Furthermore, simulations show how this new oscillator architecture can provide tailored seed pulses with high enough spectral energy density and low enough nonlinear phase to generate sub-200 fs, 40 µJ, > 180 MW pulses from an all-fiber setup involving a single tapered-fiber power amplifier, without pulse picking.

Multi-channel broadband optical chaos generation assisted by phase modulation and CFBG feedback

In this paper, we propose a novel and simple multi-channel broadband optical chaos generation scheme based on phase modulation and chirped fiber Bragg grating (CFBG). Firstly, phase modulation is introduced to generate more new frequency components to broaden the spectrum of the phase chaos. Meanwhile, the accumulated dispersion from CFBG distorts the intensity chaos, converts phase chaos to intensity chaos, and weakens the laser relaxation oscillation. This process would lead to energy redistribution in the power spectrum, effectively increasing the chaotic bandwidth. Then, the wavelength detuning between CFBG and the semiconductor laser is introduced to enhance the chaotic bandwidth further. The experiment results show that the 10 dB bandwidths of the five channels are up to 31.0 GHz, 34.3 GHz, 36.3 GHz, 40 GHz, and 40 GHz, respectively. Note that the maximum bandwidth of the PD in our experiment is limited to 40 GHz. In addition, the multi-channel chaotic signals obtained from the experiment system are used to generate multi-channel physical random numbers. After the post-processing operations, the total rate of five parallel high-speed physical random number generation channels is 4.64 Tbit/s (160 GSa/s × 5bit × 1 channel + 160 GSa/s × 6bit × 4 channels). As far as we know, this is the highest record of using external cavity feedback semiconductor lasers to generate random numbers, which has great potential to meet the security requirements of next-generation Tbit/s optical communication systems.

Enabling ultra-high bit rate transmission with CFBG as dispersion compensator in an OptiSpan 240 km DWDM network

Abstract In this paper, a dispersion compensation technique for an ultra-long haul optical network utilizing a chirped fiber Bragg grating (CFBG) is presented. A high bit-rate signal of 40 Gbps is inputted into each channel. The CFBG, employed for dispersion compensation, is positioned after demultiplexing, enabling effortless network upgrades. The grating parameters of the implemented CFBG are mathematically analyzed and optimized to counteract net dispersion of over 3153 ps/nm across the channel. The design is verified using the OptiSystem software, resulting in a successful transmission up to 240 km with an average Q-factor of 8.09, utilizing an amplification gain of 49.5 dB. Additionally, the achieved optical signal-to-noise ratio (OSNR) level using the symmetrical amplification technique surpasses the acceptable value, with an average bit error rate of 10−16.

In-fiber chirped Fabry-Perot cavity for temperature sensing.

Measurement resolution and dynamic range of conventional optical fiber sensors are often mutually restricted. In this work, an in-fiber chirped Fabry-Perot cavity (interferometer) is proposed, for the first time to our knowledge, to resolve the conflict between the resolution and dynamic range. The chirped Fabry-Perot interferometer is constructed by two chirped fiber Bragg gratings inscribed in the opposite directions, resulting in a gradually varied (i.e., chirp) cavity length for different reflection wavelengths. As such, the interference spectrum exhibits high figure of merit (FOM) and large free spectrum range (FSR) at long and short wavelength regions, respectively, enabling high-resolution and large-dynamic-range measurement simultaneously. Temperature tests are then carried out to confirm the validity of the solution. The proposed sensing schema may be developed further and find vital applications in biomedicine fields such as endosomatic temperature monitoring of living bodies. The proposed concept of chirped Fabry-Perot interferometer can provide breakout ideas for other sensing scenarios where high-resolution and large-dynamic range are demanded and can be further generalized to other measurands or even free-space interference metrologies.

Extended measurement range of optical profiler using chirped fiber Bragg grating-based chirped spectral-domain interferometry

A conventional spectral-domain interferometer (SDI) has limitations in measurement range due to using broadband sources with low coherence lengths and spectrometers with limited pixel numbers. We propose chirped spectral-domain interferometry (CSDI) to extend the measurement range. The CSDI exploits chirped fiber Bragg gratings (CFBG) to induce dispersion in the reference arm and generates a chirped interference signal from an unbalanced interferometer. Convolution-based signal processing allows us to uniquely determine the surface position of the sample from the chirped interference signal. The sample surface geometry could then be reconstructed by analyzing the change in position of the convolution peaks. From the theoretical background, we know that the maximum measurable range of the CSDI is determined by the effective refractive index and length of the CFBG used. Experimentally, a maximum measuring range of 59 mm was measured. It is a significant improvement over conventional SDI, despite using a broadband light source and a limited number of pixels. We developed the surface profiler and demonstrated its performance in surface imaging on various samples with different reflectivity.

High-power and high-speed all-optical all-fiber wavelength-swept source at 2 μm based on a femtosecond laser and time stretch technique

We present an all-fiber all-optical high-speed wavelength-swept laser source at 2 μm with a 3-dB bandwidth of 33 nm and repetition rate of 18.4 MHz, by using optical time-stretch technology, which to our knowledge is the first report of a 2 μm wavelength-swept source without any bulk, free-space optical elements. The light source is built upon a nonlinear polarization rotation mode-locked femtosecond oscillator. A chirped fiber Bragg grating (CFBG) is employed to realize the all-optical wavelength sweeping. In comparison with the commonly used dispersive fibers, the CFBG possesses outstanding power efficiency and temporal stability, especially for wavelength sweeping in the 2.0 μm wavelength regime. A two-stage fiber amplifier system is utilized to boost the output power up to 1.01 W. This all-fiberized mode-locked swept source with high speed and high stability shows great potential as a valuable source for various spectroscopy applications and swept source optical coherence tomography, particularly for highly scattering medium with low water content.

High reflectivity, ultraflat-spectrum chirped fiber Bragg grating written using low energy UV femtosecond pulses

Chirped fiber Bragg gratings (CFBGs) have been extensively used in applications such as ultrafast lasers, fiber sensors, and fiber communications. This work presents a comprehensive investigation of CFBG written using a 257 nm femtosecond laser and a linear chirped phase mask. The CFBG, written on a hydrogen-loaded polarization-maintaining fiber, exhibited a center wavelength of 1031.7 nm and a bandwidth of 11.97 nm. The CFBG achieved an average reflectivity of 98.2 % within its bandwidth, demonstrating an ultrahigh flatness of the reflection spectrum with a low spectral reflectivity variance of 0.00003 (σ2). The high group velocity dispersion (GVD) of 60.7 ps2 signifies its potential in fiber chirped pulse amplification systems and dispersion compensation system. Meanwhile, the fs-laser + PM writing method shows advantages of high efficiency and low energy consumption (as low as 2 nJ), owing to the high photosensitivity of the fiber to the UV band, which holds significant promise in fiber grating inscription.